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Startup Developing Educational Aids for Children with Vision Disabilities

Europe, ICT, April 10 2017

CROATIA: Thanks to the startup’s projects, children who are blind or have low vision can learn Braille and identify objects in the environment.

A meeting with children with vison disabilities and getting acquainted with their daily difficulties was the major reason for the establishment of a startup from Rijeka called Braille Riddles, which is oriented towards education of children who are blind or have low vision, reports Poslovni.hr.

Eight students from universities in Rijeka, Zagreb and Dublin noticed that people who are blind or have low vision face limited opportunities for personal development in a large number of situations in everyday life, which greatly affects their integration into society. Thus they conceived, and shortly thereafter created, a line of accessible educational aids for children who are blind or have low vision.

The realization of the project was facilitated by their entry into the startup program of the town of Rijeka, where during the six-month incubation period they attended a range of workshops, had an opportunity to rely on the help of mentors and, ultimately, thanks to the cooperation with Sven Maričić, turn their ideas into tangible products.

“The advantage of these products is that they allow children, in an interesting and fun way, to start learning the Braille writing system, and thus develop their own cognitive and intellectual abilities, which has as the ultimate goal the improvement in the quality of life”, said Toma Babić, one of the Braille Riddles team members. He pointed out that, thanks to their ideas, children not only learn Braille, but at the same time they identify objects from the environment, which greatly contributes to the understanding of spatial orientation.

“Our plans for the future include expanding the range of current products by creating a puzzle with different motifs, and further enhancement and expansion of the design so that the products become adapted to different age groups. In addition, we plan to develop our aids in the direction of crating novel products”, said Babić. He added that one of the goals is fundraising and organizing investments in order to be able to turn their plans into reality, which would help children who are blind or have low vision create better opportunities to develop their skills.

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